Senior Associate, Experience Design

New York Life Insurance Co; New York (NY); Hybrid; USD 115,000 - 135,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Discretionary bonus eligible

Job summary

New York Life is seeking a Senior Associate, Experience Design to lead the visual and interaction expression of NYL.com across key journeys. You will own design execution within the brand and activation lane, ensuring scalable, consistent experiences aligned to the brand system.

This role emphasizes reusable patterns, pattern-driven growth, and cross-functional collaboration. The ideal candidate brings 5–8+ years in digital experience design, strong visual and interaction craft, and experience

Qualifications

• Portfolio required with resume; include case studies or links.
• Expert understanding of human-centered design, interaction design, visual design, and user experience.
• Bachelor’s in Design, Interaction Design, Communication Design or related discipline; equivalent practical experience considered.

Responsibilities

• Lead experience across journeys for the website, defining cohesive visual and interaction patterns.
• Drive consistency with brand standards and translate principles into reusable patterns.
• Design campaigns and activation experiences and connect them to the broader digital ecosystem.
• Apply and evolve design systems across experiences, aligning with system standards.
• Deliver production-ready work with defined interaction details and states.
• Manage multiple workstreams with high quality and consistency; communicate decisions clearly.

Skills

Human-centered design

Interaction design

Visual design

User experience

Brand systems

Collaboration

Education

Bachelor's degree in Design or related field

Job description

Senior Associate, Experience Design

New York, New York, United States

Summary

• Full-time
• Hybrid | Onsite 3x/week (Tues-Thurs)
• Experience and Digital Marketing

What makes us stand out

As an award-winning Fortune 100 Company, diversity and humanity are deeply rooted values in our company culture. We are vocal advocates for a supportive and inclusive work culture that inspires our employees to do meaningful, life-changing work. We believe there is a wealth of knowledge we can learn from one another, and that together, we can enact real-world change.

When you join New York Life, you're joining a company that values career development, collaboration, innovation, and inclusiveness. We want employees to feel proud about being part of a company that is committed to doing the right thing. You'll have the opportunity to grow your career while developing personally and professionally through various resources and programs. If you're ready to channel your creativity and strategic insight into an environment that values impact, we can't wait to welcome you to our team.

About the role

As a Senior Product Designer focused on brand & activation, you’ll lead the visual and experiential expression of NYL.com across key journeys and touchpoints. This role owns design execution and evolution within the brand & activation lane, ensuring experiences are scalable, consistent, and aligned to the NYL.com experience model (modular, intent-driven, and system-based). You are responsible for how the brand shows up across high-visibility moments and everyday experiences—ensuring consistency across campaigns, entry points, and downstream journeys. This includes identifying where patterns break and informing system-level improvements that support scalable brand expression. You’ll take direction at the initiative level and translate it into cohesive visual systems, interaction patterns, and shipped experiences. In parallel, you’ll define reusable patterns for activation and storytelling, reducing one-off design and strengthening consistency across the ecosystem.

What you’ll do

Lead experience across journeys for website

• Define, extend, and apply cohesive visual and interaction patterns across journeys and touchpoints
• Drive consistency and quality across experiences, ensuring alignment with brand standards
• Translate brand principles into clear, usable design patterns, modules, and experiences within defined system
• Elevate the overall quality and craft of execution across workstreams
• Define and scale reusable patterns for activation experiences, reducing one-off design and improving consistency across campaigns and touchpoints

Support brand activation & campaign experiences

• Design high-impact campaign and activation experiences (e.g., sponsorships, launches)
• Ensure campaign work connects back into the broader .com ecosystem
• Apply reusable patterns to activation work to support scalability and consistency
• Balance storytelling, engagement, and conversion within campaign experiences

Apply and evolve design systems

• Apply design system components, templates, and patterns across experiences, ensuring alignment with system standards
• Identify gaps in visual or interaction patterns and propose improvements in alignment with design system direction
• Inform and shape system evolution by identifying gaps in brand expression and proposing scalable patterns for inclusion
• Ensure consistent use of typography, color, spacing, and interaction standards
• Ensure brand expression scales effectively within system constraints by prioritizing reusable patterns over one-off solutions

Deliver high-quality, production-ready work

• Ensure designs are implementation-ready and aligned with system standards
• Define key interaction details and states to support high-quality build
• Partner with Product, Engineering, and Content to ensure accurate delivery

Execute within defined strategy and direction

• Translate initiative-level direction into cohesive visual and interaction solutions
• Manage multiple workstreams while maintaining a high bar for quality and consistency
• Identify inconsistencies or gaps across experiences and proactively address them
• Communicate design decisions, tradeoffs, and updates clearly to stakeholders and design leadership
• Stay aligned with design leadership on priorities, direction, and standards
• Escalate requirements that fall outside established system patterns
• Ensure experiences align to clear user intent (explore, evaluate, act) and contribute to a connected ecosystem, not isolated touchpoints
• Own design decisions within the brand & activation lane that align with system standards and brand principles; elevate only when cross-lane or system-level tradeoffs are required

You should have

• Portfolio Please include a portfolio or case studies as a document or link with your resume when applying, including any passwords. Please DO NOT use Drop box or other file sharing solution, we cannot access it.
• Expert understanding of human-centered design principles, interaction design, visual design, and user experience.
• A bachelor's in a relevant field such as Design, Interaction Design, Communication Design or a related discipline. Equivalent practical experience will also be considered.

What You’ll Bring

You’re a designer who thinks beyond the UI - someone who understands how experience, content, and intent come together to drive outcomes.

Required skills

• 5–8+ years of experience designing digital experiences, with strong visual and interaction design craft
• Strong understanding of how brand expression scales across journeys and systems, with the ability to identify and address inconsistencies across experiences
• Ability to translate brand principles and business goals into clear, consistent design decisions, including navigating tradeoffs across teams and constraints
• Experience working within component-based design systems, balancing consistency with expressive flexibility and contributing to pattern definition
• Strong understanding of content structure and storytelling, and how it supports user intent across journeys
• Ability to take defined direction and execute with a high degree of ownership in ambiguous environments
• Strong collaboration skills across Product, Engineering, Marketing, and Content
• Ability to connect experiences across touchpoints, ensuring brand consistency across campaigns, entry points, and downstream journeys

Preferred skills

• Familiarity with analytics tools (e.g., Adobe Analytics, Google Analytics) and experimentation platforms
• Experience in financial services or other regulated industries with complex decision-making journeys
• Experience working on multi-step, high-consideration user flows that support exploration, evaluation, and decision-making
• Experience working within CMS or component-based systems balancing flexibility with consistency

Your communication style

• Adaptable with the ability to bring clarity and structure to ambiguity.
• Strong communication skills: Ability to leverage your expert communication, presentation, and interpersonal skills with cross-functional teams, stakeholders, and executives.
• Strong organization and attention to detail.

And if you have this, we really want to hear from you

• Experience in life insurance, financial services, or other highly regulated industry for complex application or servicing experiences

Pay transparency

Discretionary bonus eligible: Yes

Actual base salary will be determined based on several factors but not limited to individual’s experience, skills, qualifications, and job location. Additionally, employees are eligible for an annual discretionary bonus. In addition to base salary, employees may also be eligible to participate in an incentive program.

Salary Range: $115,000 - $135,000

Company Overview

At New York Life, our 180-year legacy of purpose and integrity fuels our future. As we evolve into a more technology-, data-, and AI-enabled organization, we remain grounded in the values that drive lasting impact.

Our diverse business portfolio creates opportunities to make a difference across industries and communities—inviting bold thinking, collaborative problem-solving, and purpose-driven innovation. Here, you’ll find the rare balance of long-standing stability and forward momentum, supported by an inclusive team that honors tradition while embracing progress.

As a Fortune 100 mutual company, we offer a place to grow your skills, contribute to meaningful work, and deliver solutions that matter. Your ideas drive what’s next, and your growth powers it.

We provide a full package of benefits for employees – and have unique offerings for a modern workforce, including leave programs, adoption assistance, and student loan repayment programs. Based on feedback from our employees, we continue to refine and add benefits to our offering, so that you can flourish both inside and outside of work. Click here to discover more about our comprehensive benefit options or visit our NYL Benefits Site.

Our Commitment to Inclusion

At New York Life, fostering an inclusive workplace is fundamental to who we are and how we serve our communities. We have a longstanding commitment to creating an environment where individuals can contribute their best and succeed together. This foundation is rooted in our core values of humanity and integrity, ensuring that every employee feels valued and supported. By embracing a broad range of perspectives and experiences, we achieve greater success and fulfill our promise of providing financial security and peace of mind to families across all communities. Click here to learn more about New York Life’s leadership in this space.

Recognized as one of Fortune’s World’s Most Admired Companies

New York Life is committed to improving local communities through a culture of employee giving and volunteerism, supported by the Foundation. We're proud that due to our mutuality, we operate in the best interests of our policy owners. To learn more about career opportunities at New York Life, please visit the Careers page of www.NewYorkLife.com.

Visit our LinkedIn to see how our employees and agents are leading the industry and impacting communities.

Visit our Newsroom to learn more about how our company is constantly evolving to meet our clients' and employees’ needs.

Disclaimer 1 :

Eligibility for, and benefits under, the Pension Plan and 401(k) Savings Plan (“Plans”) are determined in accordance with the terms of the applicable plan document. Employees of certain subsidiaries, including but not limited to Group Benefit Solutions, employees of Life Insurance Company of North America and New York Life Group Insurance Company of NY, are not eligible to participate in the Pension Plan. In the event of a conflict between this information and the applicable plan document, the applicable plan document governs. The Company reserves the right to amend or terminate the Plans at any time.